|
|
Dark, dark, dark. Xander is used to being in Sunnydale High School at night-time, but this is really pushing it. The last time he was in a classroom at night for anything other than slayage duties or research was for the love spell with Amy, and all he can hope was that this won?t be a repeat of that little adventure. After all, being the stud of Sunnydale might sound nice, but as an experience it came nowhere near up to standard.
But it's either this or spend the next couple months until Graduation feeling like a jackass whenever he sees Cordelia, and this Anya chick at least seems like a nice girl. Sure, she's a witch, but so is Wills, and she's still as sweet as--
Nope. Not gonna have that thought.
Besides, Willow hadn't been so sweet earlier, when she'd snapped at them for calling her Old Reliable. Which was to be expected cause, hey--not the bestest nickname for a girl to have. Sure, Willow is trustworthy and sweet, but the strain of that had to hit her sometime. Everyone's expectations on her shoulders.
And that is the joy of being Xander Harris, he thinks almost smugly. No one expects anything but what you've been steadily supplying: average looks, brains, and fighting ability.
But that thought comes with a little regret and plenty of annoyance because hey, he's come through on occasion. Lots of occasions, in actual fact, which brings forth the memory of bombs and zombies and oh, Faith's hands...
He decides to move on before his thoughts get him in trouble. After all, he is all alone in a room with a girl, whether she's occupied with setting up some weird circle or not. And the memory of Faith's hands brings forth the memory of Faith's hands wrapped around his neck as she wriths on top of him, and a feeling of helplessness that he can't say he entirely hates. Lack-of-air, however, he can vouch for. Didn't like that feeling much.
But anyway. He clears his throat, and Anya looks up from her circle of bones and herbs with wide, clear eyes. "So, uh...can we get on with this?"
"Oh...yes, of course." She lights a candle with a match, biting her lip as the flame flares to life. "There. Now, come over here quickly. Lets get this done as soon as possible."
Xander walks over on his knees, almost crawling, amused at the girl's blunt way of speaking. "Yes, Mistress. Whatever you say," he replies, deadpan, smirking when she gives him an annoyed look.
"I am not your Mistress, but you will obey me, otherwise the spell will turn out wrong. Now sit there and behave properly." She points to a spot across from her, on the other side of the circle.
He shrugs and moves into place. Looking down at the floor, he sees a plate in the middle of the circle, painted with the likeness of a gold necklace set with a green stone. "Hey, what's this?"
Anya laughs, making Xander suddenly feel uneasy. "Well, you didn't think that I was doing this spell solely for you, did you? I need to get my necklace back."
Somewhat reassured by that, Xander relaxes a bit. Helping someone to fulfill your own needs makes sense to him. "Oh. Okay. So what happened to it?"
She blushes. "It was a family heirloom passed down for generations. Then it was stolen from my mom's apartment."
"They have safe deposit boxes for things like that, you know."
Anya doesn't seem amused at his attempt to help. "Yes well, this is after the fact. But I need to get it back. Now. Before I kill myself," she says under her breath.
O...kay. Xander wonders at her attachment to some necklace, but whatever. Everyone had their things. "And this spell will do...what, exactly?"
She seems a little more sure of this. "Well, we both call on Eryishon, the Endless One, offer up the standard supplication, then there's a teensy temporal fold. We hope."
"Uh-huh. And a temporal fold is..."
This pisses Anya off. "I already told you. It turns back time to the place where it was lost. In my case, the time before the necklace was stolen; in yours, where your relationship with Cordelia ended. Though I don't know why you'd want her back, anyway. I know her and she isn't a nice girl. And she hates you," she sniffs.
"Yes, well. I'd rather not have the girl I used to date despising me, so can we just do this?" Dammit. He's starting to regret this already, and they haven't even done the stupid spell. He has bad luck with magick; but on the other hand, if he'd just let Willow do that stupid de-lusting spell, he wouldn't be here in the first place.
Anya shrugs. "I suppose."
Okay then. "So we'll both be happy when this spell is done."
That one gave her pause. "Oh, you'll be happy," she says quietly. "Can't guarantee you'll get what you think you want though."
Huh? He's about to interrupt, but she is already starting the ritual. Closing her eyes, she reaches out her hand. "Eryishon. K'shala. Meh-uhn."
Thats his cue. He extends his own hand, touching it to hers and stating the words she'd insisted he memorize: "Diprecht. Doh-tehenlo nu-Eryishon."
Anya's sure voice cuts through again. "The child to the mother."
"The river to the sea."
"Eryishon, hear my prayer."
And suddenly, a scene appears in his mind; many scenes, actually, like a movie being fast-forwarded. A woman with a mottled face; some kind of demon, he assumes. Giles, being hit by the demon chick. Himself and Willow in leather, making love. Fighting. Killing, with vampire faces. Buffy, with lots of dark eyeliner, backhanding Willow, who snarls. Fighting Angel. And an overall feeling of foreboding.
And then, he feels Anya pour the purply sand-stuff. He wants to cry out, to protest, tell her to stop, but it feels like his tongue is frozen; he's almost paralyzed. His hands are shaking, and he spills the sand on himself, over his fingers...
And then, in a blast of light, it's over. He's shaking, breathing hard. Unable to completely comprehend what he has just seen but frightened nonetheless. "What the--the hell was that?" Completely aware that he is freaking out but not much caring. And the image of him and Willow, naked and moving together, is imprinted on his eyelids.
But Anya--she isn't paying attention to him. Instead, she is pawing around on the ground, hands in the herbs and the sand and the bones, searching the plate. "Where is it? Where is it?!"
Xander's still panting, but he manages to sound forceful. "I want to know what the hell that was, and I want to know now!"
On hands and knees, Anya looks up at him, saying succinctly, "I swear I'm just trying to find my necklace." Lie written all over her face.
Extremely pissed now, on his feet, Xander shrugs nonchalantly. "Hey, here's a thought. Try searching the couch down there in Hell, cause that's all that I saw!" And Anya is apparently speechless, so Xander just stalks out, completely freaked and very, very angry. Because not only did he see into this crazy Hell place where he and Willow are vampires, the spell didn't even work. Because Anya didn't get her necklace back, and it sure as hell doesn't feel like he's gone back in time.
And of course, he's right. He hasn't gone back in time; another Xander has gone forward. Not only forward, but to a whole other universe, where he's alone in the factory and the Master isn't here and he can't smell his mate, his Willow; not anywhere. And he doesn't like it, not at all.
Unlike his Willow, who gets cutely petulant and pouty and eventually violent when she's displeased, this Xander tends to go straight for violent. It doesn't help matters any that he was in the middle of a fight when he was zapped here or fell out of the sky or whatever. He'd been getting his ass pretty thoroughly kicked by the Slayer and Puppy, and he remembers the sharpened stake coming at him, and meeting Willow's eyes as her mouth formed a bright red O...
Because if he was gonna be staked, he wanted the last thing he saw to be her; his Willow.
But he isn't dust, staked; he is here. And it isn't so much like he has disappeared from his world as his world has disappeared from around him, leaving him exactly where he had been but with no-one else there.
That thought makes him growl, heavily, and he decides to get the hell out of there before he becomes even more confused.
Besides, he is hungry.
Once he gets out into the open air he feels better. He can breathe--not that he really needs to, but the feeling of fresh air in his lungs is nice nonetheless. It smells fresh here, like blood and people and oranges. A strange combination, but one that makes him lick his lips slowly. The scent on the air reminds him of Willow, right after she's fed, when her lips are red and moist. When he can bury his face in the flesh of her neck and smell the hot blood pumping through her veins. The perfume she wears is citrusy.
The air in his world smells different, like sulfur and death. Here, everything is teeming with life. People are roaming the streets like cockroaches.
Its disgusting.
But whatever is happening, he'll have it all under control in a little bit. As soon as he finds his mate and he can think straight again, he will make this world the ways its supposed to be.
His.
He doesn't make a conscious decision to go to the Bronze, not really. Its just that whenever he finishes a kill, like the vicious one he just executed, his feet take him immediately to the Master's dwelling place. The old vampire always insists that they report their hunts to him, and Xander figures its as much for his pleasure as to keep tabs on them. The Master doesn't hunt much anymore, because there's really no need for it, and it brings him very little happiness. He does, however, love to listen for hours to Willow explain her killing methods in a low and sensuous voice, eyes locked on him. It makes Xander want to kill something.
As soon as he gets to the Bronze, Xander can tell that it is not a vampire's lair, as it is in his world. Instead, it seems to be the local teen hangout, as it was in the days before he was turned. Interesting, he thinks. Maybe I have gone back in time.
But he doesn't think so, because it seems like it's the same time. Just different, like a different world. Makes him edgy, annoyed. And if he doesn't find Willow soon some heads are going to fucking roll.
He walks inside and gets some interesting looks, making him wonder what's wrong. He looks normal, as far as he can tell. Not that he has the advantage of a mirror, but Will has never complained, so... Tight black leather is definitely his thing, and he only wishes that he had found that out before his death. Living Xander probably would've gotten laid more often. Or at all.
He thinks back on the life before his death fondly, if distantly. Its as if he has memories of someone else's existence, someone weaker and stupider than he's ever been. But there are still parts of him that are uniquely Xander-he loves the X-men, and eats Cheetos by the bagful, which makes Willow yell and giggle when he tries to kiss her.
That thought brings him back to his mission, and he looks around the club, stalking his prey like a true predator. If Willow is here, he will know it. He recognizes her scent by heart; due to their frequent sexual contact and a ritual which has their demons (for all intents and purposes) mated, her scent and his have blended into something that smells like chocolate-covered oranges; sweet and spicy. He flares his nostrils but finds Willow's scent only on his leather jacket, which he maker her wear whenever he thinks it is too cold for her.
But there is a light scent in here, somewhere, that is almost Willow's scent. It is more like the scent Willow had when she was alive, and he gets a very distinct memory of the night he turned her; his nose buried in her hair, her neck, soaking up all the scents he overlooked while alive. His fangs, buried in her neck as his fingers worked their way under her flouncy skirt, breaking through her tights...
Before he is overcome with arousal, he focuses more strongly on the light scent. Maybe not his Willow, but Willow nonetheless. And if not Willow, someone who has been around her. Recently.
He passes through the crowd of dancers quickly, not noticing the gawking looks he is given by several students. Instead he follows her scent to the stage, and then beyond it, to where two men are talking over a amp.
The older-looking one is bitching about something insignificant, and Xander chooses to ignore him. He is not the one who smells like Willow.
The other one, the short one who is not human, does smell like Willow. Not like he's been fucking her-if he did, Xander would have ripped his throat out in a second-but like he's been close to her, perhaps in the last hour.
Quickly, before either of them have a chance to react, Xander has thrown the tall boy out of the way and has the little one pressed against the wall. His blood is pumping fast and sweet, and Xander can't help but lean in and lick him on the neck. "Where is she?" he growls quickly, shaking the not-human.
The boy's eyes are wide, and he seems confused. "X-Xander," he says slowly. "What are you talking about?"
What? How does this little mortal freak know his name? He's confused now, and that makes him dangerous. So rather than answer the kids question, he presses his elbow underneath the other boy's neck and presses hard. "How do you know me?"
"You're my friend." The kid answers quickly, and Xander is confused again as he pulls back to look at him. at first he doesn't recognize him, then...
A slow, snake-like grin slides over his face. He presses closer to the boy, and bares his teeth. "You're a white hat," he says very distinctly. The boy doesn't seem to get the reference, so Xander shakes him again. "I thought your hair was different."
"Well, he changes it a lot."
The voice-and the punch-come at him before he even expects them to, and he is knocked away from the not-human who smells like fear and confusion. Standing before him, completely dressed and surprisingly confident, is another vampire.
At first he was pissed off, but now he's amused. "Puppy," he says in a low, intimate voice. "Didn't expect to see you out of your cage again so soon. Me and Will'll have to punish you." He sees the not-human-he's coming to recognize that scent as 'werewolf'-stiffen a little after hearing her name, and Xander thinks, triumphantly, So you do know her.
Puppy, however, seems honestly confused by that. He is looking at Xander with a strange look on his face, a look that makes Xander want to rip out Puppy's heart and feed it to him. "Xander, what the hell are you doing? This is ridiculous."
A hot swell of rage comes over him at this. Not only is Puppy out of his cage, he is addressing Xander by name, and calling him 'ridiculous.' Xander thinks mournfully of the holy water back in the Factory, but tries not to dwell on it for too long. Instead, he bares his teeth again, at Puppy this time. Other people would call it a smile. "I just want to know where she is."
Puppy seems confused, and the white hat behind him is clutching his throat and staring. Xander exhales, something he does very rarely. "I want. To know. Where she is," he says in a low and completely reasonable voice.
The two men are still staring at him like he's crazy, and the wolf speaks up. "Who? Buffy?"
Xander growls in frustration. "As if I'd want to see the fucking Slayer. Where is my Willow?"
"Willow," Puppy says, as if putting it all together. He gives Xander another once-over and seems to reach his conclusion. "You're a vampire."
He raised an eyebrow, mockingly. "This is a news flash? Where've you been, Puppy?"
"Why are you calling him that?" the human guy he threw earlier asks hesitantly. He's gotten up, and now he's standing curiously behind Xander.
With a hiss, Xander grabs him by the neck, making the werewolf white hat gasp. He shifts quickly into game face, fangs teasingly close to the kid's neck. "Now," he says in a friendly tone, "tell me where Willow is. I can smell her all over you." He snarls suddenly, thinking of how this wolf must have touched her to be drenched in her scent, even though she's nowhere around.
Apparently Puppy is trying to play ambassador, because he has the wolf behind him and his hands out in front of him. "Xander. We're not gonna let you kill Willow, you know that. Now let that guy go, and we'll find a way to help you."
"Help me what?" Xander scoffs. "I don't know what you're talking about, Puppy. She's already like me. Why would I kill her?"
"You vamped Willow." Oh, and apparently the wolfy has decided to speak up. Goodie. But after another look at the wolf's face, Xander backs up a little, and holds the human by the neck a little tighter. Wolf-boy's voice is calm and even, but his nostrils are flaring, and rage is coming off him in waves.
"Years ago," Xander replies in a bored tone, although he's becoming increasingly uncomfortable here. "But I can smell her on you-and she smells alive. Now, how is that?" He's honestly confused now, and that makes him want to break the neck of the human in his hands. But Puppy has something behind his back now, and for all Xander knows, it's a stake, so...
Before either the werewolf or the other vampire can make a move, Xander throws the human at them both, knocking them down and hopefully debilitating them for awhile. He breaks out in a run before either can get up, and he goes off the stage, through the crowd, and out the same door he came in.
Fast as fucking lighting, he tells himself. No joy here; no Willow. But at least he's not dust.
To Be Continued...
